Author's Note: My apologies for Adam's internal monologue regarding a certain lovely goalie. Rest assured, those thoughts are not indicative of his overall feelings...he simply has his head uncomfortably far up his posterior at the moment.

Adam sat back in his desk chair, staring at yet another spreadsheet as he shifted around, trying to find a comfortable position. The Adderall he'd taken twenty minutes earlier and the cup of coffee in front of him were doing nothing to cut through the drowsiness that was starting to consume every fiber of his being, his pale eyelids feeling as though they had 100 lb. weights attached.

Worse, beads of sweat were already starting to run down his forehead as snot dripped down his nose—there in his cool office, it felt like his broken body had turned into Niagra Falls. He reached into his desk and pulled out another pill bottle, staring at the label as he contemplated what to do. Another OxyContin or three would turn off the spigot and cut through at least a little bit of the pain, but it would also slow everything else down. As it was, he was already struggling to stay awake, his sandpaper coated eyes and sleep deprived brain trying in vain to process all of the numbers in front of him.

Just as he was weighing the misery of withdraw against the near impossibility of keeping his eyes open, his cell phone buzzed.

Laura.

"Hey. I'm kind of busy right now. What do you need?"

As he struggled to wipe his nose while holding the phone with his one useful hand, he could hear her sigh. In the background, it was obvious that Will was throwing another tantrum over something.

How hard is raise kids who don't act like a couple of idiots?

"I don't need anything, Adam. I was just calling to remind you that Tucker has a hockey game tonight. Do you think you could try to make it?"

"I have to work, dear."

"Look, you've missed every game this season…"

Ah, and to think that one of the reasons Julie broke up with me was because I 'wasn't interested in traveling'. Well guess what, Jules? I get to go on guilt trips every fucking day. How's that for a sense of adventure, you self-righteous bitch?

"It would really mean a lot to him if you could make it for at least part of the game. They're playing an away game against the Panthers, so they'll literally be three minutes from your office." She paused for a moment, trying to find the right words.

"I'm not saying you have to stay there the entire time or anything, just make an appearance. Show up for ten minutes, tell him he did a good job, then you can go back to whatever you feel like doing."

Looking out the window, he could see a man pushing a stroller across the crowded sidewalk, a blonde toddler sitting on his shoulders.

"What I feel like doing? For fuck's sake, Laura, what the hell do you think I do all day? Do you think I stare at spreadsheets for the fun of it? That I go to work every day because it was this or stamp collecting?"

Once again, he could hear her sigh.

"Come on, cut the guilt trip and quit wasting my time with this stupid shit." He thought, staring back down at the blue bezel of his dad's old Rolex Yachtmaster, the slow sweep of the second hand reminding him of all of the things he needed to be doing.

"You know perfectly well that is not what I meant." She replied after a second, the frustration growing more evident in her voice. "You don't have to be an asshole. I was just wanting to remind you that you have two sons who would really like to see their father every now and then. You know, the two kids who you wanted to have."

"What the hell do you want me to do? Quit my job? Move us all into a fucking refrigerator box? We could see a ton of each other then…well, I mean, until we all freeze to death under a damn bridge!"

"Well shit Adam, considering how often your paycheck goes up your nose, I'm pretty sure that's what we're all going to end up doing, anyway. You might as well spend a few minutes of quality time with the boys now so that they'll have something happy to reminisce on at your funeral."

I'm pretty sure me being gone would be the happy thing. Maybe then they could get a good dad.

"You know what? You can be a real sanctimonious bitch sometimes."

For a moment, there was silence. As he sat there staring at his computer screen, he kept expecting to hear a 'fuck you' or 'go to hell'. Instead, the only sound was Will's tantrum in the background, followed by the soft click of the call ending a moment later.

She hung up on me.

I'm not even worth arguing with.

Hunching over at his desk, he buried his face in his hand. His nose slowly dripping onto the sleeve of his cotton dress shirt, his mind drifted away from the world of spreadsheets and bills, back the night he first laid eyes on Laura from across the room of the Sigma Chi basement. He could still smell the cigarette smoke and cheap beer, and hear her laughing with her friends. He could still picture the madras skirt and kelly green sweater she had on, and how in the sea of skin-tight dresses and stilettos, he knew she was the one, finally regaining the warm fluttery feeling he'd last experienced with Julie. And, he could still taste the hot, watered down can of Michelob that he spent three hours nursing in the kitchen alone, too scared to go speak to the girl of his dreams downstairs.

"It sure is a good thing I got over that fear." He thought to himself ruefully.

Worked out almost as well as overcoming my fear of hockey.

April, 2001

"Come on, how can Michelangelo be your favorite? It's like I don't even know you anymore!" Adam joked, looking over at Laura.

She was sitting in the chair next to his bed, curled up barefoot under a hunter green Deerfield throw blanket she'd brought over from her dorm room. At her feet sat a pair of boat shoes and a monogrammed L.L. Bean tote overstuffed with textbooks, the canvas looking worn from the daily trips back and forth between the university and the hospital.

"Dude. He likes pizza. I like pizza. He has a colorful vocabulary. He's good with a set of nunchucks." She paused thoughtfully for a moment, fluffing a madras throw pillow that sat in her lap. "And you know, technically, he has the most potential, he just hasn't really tapped into it yet."

"But he's a dumbass."

"Well, yeah, but so are you, and I kind of like you, anyway."

"I'm not a dumbass like him!"

"Well, of course you're not." She smiled, leaning forward to ruffle his sandy hair. The little silver set of skis on her charm bracelet batted against his eyebrow as she then leaned down give him a quick kiss. "You're not a turtle, and you can't use nunchucks. In many ways, you're a way lamer dumbass than he is."

'Well darn, I guess you do have a point there."

"Don't worry, you're also a lot cuter than he is."

"That's…that's good." He laughed, a small bit of sparkle returning to his eyes. "I really pride myself on being cuter than the average crime fighting terrapin."

"As you should!"

"I'm going across the street to grab lunch. You need anything, Carol?"

Standing over the long reception desk, it seemed obvious that Carol had to have been a hire made under orders from someone's jealous wife. The other secretaries, for other departments, were generally 23 years old, and all shared an affinity for short skirts, low cut blouses, and breast implants—he often suspected that breast size was actually listed on their resumes, right alongside 'proficient in Microsoft Word' and 'attentive to detail'.

Supposedly, Lindzee from accounting still had dreams of becoming a cheerleader for the Vikings, and had all of the requisite flexibility such a job would demand.

Carol, on the other hand, was 62, favored floral polyester blouses, and enjoyed talking about her grandchildren to anyone who would listen. By mid-day, her mauve lipstick tended to migrate into the wrinkles around her mouth, and her double chin was slowly starting to turn into a triple chin. She was, in other words, not Lindzee.

"Too bad, too. Those dorks in accounting wouldn't know what to do with Lindzee." Adam had thought to himself many a times, occasionally shaking his head at the thought of all of the wasted potential.

...

Of course, he himself would have been at just as much of a loss had the situation ever presented itself, but he wasn't about to let reality get in the way of a good fantasy. In his mind, the fact that Julie and Laura were the only girls who he had ever so much as kissed, and the fact that he often had to ask for assistance just to get out of bed were neither one preclusive to the possibility of a naked Cirque de Soleil with Lindzee, complete with complicated handstands and swinging from crystal chandeliers.

In his imagination, boring details like his marriage vows, the laws of gravity, the structural integrity of light fixtures, and his complete lack of physical prowess all ceased to exist, replaced with images of Lindzee and her tan, supple breasts vigorously bouncing as he proved just what a stud he could be.

I could make her forget all about those pom poms. Never mind Christian Ponder, I'd be the Tom Brady of fucking!

...

"No dear, I brought a sandwich from home, so I'm fine. Thank you so much for asking, though."

"You're sure?"

"Of course. Have a wonderful lunch, Mr. Banks."

As he slowly made his way towards the elevator, Miss Carol Klugenfelter smiled. After twenty years at the same office, Adam was still the only one who ever bothered to ask how she was doing or whether she needed anything.

May, 2001

"Look, I'm serious. You don't deserve this."

Laura sat at Adam's bedside, squeezing his fingers as she tried not to cry. It didn't matter than he couldn't feel her hand; that he couldn't feel it as she squeezed his nubby, calloused fingertips, or gently traced the faded pink scar along his wrist with her thumbnail. Whether he could feel it or not, she still needed to touch him.

"What? And you do? You think you deserve to go through this alone?"

Adam could barely stand to look at her as he talked. Seeing her sitting there in her navy J. Crew cardigan, her hair pulled back with a tortoise shell clip, he thought of all that he was going to miss. He thought of how he would never again get to be with someone who shared his secret predilection for Troop Beverly Hills, or who understood that The Wall Street Journal was pleasure reading. He thought of the nights spent making blanket forts or jumping into the fountains on campus that they would never again share. He could still hear the sound of her laughter after they snuck into the country club pool for a late night swim under the stars, and the smell of the chlorine as they made out on the concrete steps.

He'd already lost everything.

Now, to top it all off, he was going to have to break up with the second girl he'd ever loved. The one person who still brought him some modicum of happiness.

Sighing, he tried to compose the right words in his mind.

"Well, of course not, but the difference is, there's nothing I can do about it. My life is over no matter what. But you?" He paused for a second, the tears starting to well up in his sad blue eyes. "The world is still yours. You can go find a different guy—someone who can buy you a big gorgeous house and a new Range Rover every year, and who can give you a bunch of perfect kids, who'll all wear perfect little outfits every day, and practice their tennis serves out in the backyard tennis court. It'll be lovely, and soon, all of this will just be a distant memory."

Fuck.

Saying those words killed him. He didn't want to be a distant memory. He wanted Laura. He wanted the palatial eight-bedroom colonial, and the happy, gorgeous wife, and the house full of carefree Polo clad children who thought their dad was amazing. He wanted the life that had been in front of him two weeks earlier.

And now, all of that was gone.

He would never be able to have those things…but Laura still could.

"I'm never the one who wanted that life, Adam! You're the one who wanted that. I wanted you. I wanted us to be happy."

He could tell that she was getting angry; that he was hurting her.

Still, it was for the best.

"What would make me happy is knowing that you're getting to live the life you deserve."

In the distance, he could hear that a Code Blue. As he listened to the sound of feet pounding towards the other end of the hallway, he longed to be that patient. For his broken and tattered heart to finally just stop beating all together, and for all of the pain to just go away forever. He thought back to the gun Scott always kept in the pocket of his Barbour jacket, and he wished he could move his hands enough to use it.